Making everyone happy is impossible. Pissing them off is a piece of cake. I like cake.

Sunday, July 06, 2008

Trust Me, I'm An Expert

Author's Note: The author of this post is not The Devil's Kitchen

Dumbing down. It's not just a buzzphrase, it's a fact of modern life - at least in the world of education.

The so-called experts, including administrators, policy-makers and inspectors, have brought about such a devaluation of education that "fuck off" is deemed worth marks at GCSE, people who wouldn't have passed O-levels 30 years ago can get A-levels, and university degrees are awarded to boost institutions' positions in league tables.

Now young people can (dubiously) achieve GCSEs, A levels and degrees, only to belatedly discover when they leave the education system that they are worth precisely fuck all. Because when they submit application forms, cover letters and CVs to potential employers that are as borderline illiterate as this comment (at Dave Osler's), from a supposedly "aspiring student" who has "jst (sic) completed his alevels"), they will immediately be put where they belong - in the circular file. For how can someone with such a poor command of the English language possibly meet the requirements of even the most basic office job?

Below-mediocrity is all that has been expected of 'streets_disciple' by the modern education system. That's because it has been ruined by leftist egalitarian ideologue fuckwits.

If you are so fucking stupid as to be taken in by the leftist dogma of egalitarianism - that everyone is equal in potential and in capabilities, then it is hardly surprising that when you somehow find yourself in a position to control education; control how kids are taught based on that idiot dogma, then everything turns to utter shit.

Why is it, I wonder, that the real experts - the teachers, not the overpaid apparatchiks who got to where they are by learning to spout ideologically correct crap until they started to believe it - deplore the state education finds itself in (pun intended). To Miss With Love; Scenes From The Battleground; Frank Chalk(2)*. All of them say essentially the same thing. From Snuffy:

Basics are what we all need. Noble knows it. And now his kids know it. So why the hell does our Government not know it...? If only they did, what a different world the inner city would be.

I guess it's obvious to most of us. It certainly seems to be obvious to the teachers whose blogs I have linked to today. Education has been ruined by leftist ideologue fuckwits who believe that everyone is equal, and that the more teachers pander to and patronise their charges, the better things will be. Wake up call, morons - It hasn't worked, and it won't work. It's a race to the bottom, and there are no winners.

Making 'discipline' a dirty word; letting disruptive kids' behaviour give those with potential little chance of learning anything; and giving out qualifications that sound good but mean precisely fuck all in the real world - that's the fucking scandal of education in Britain. Fortunately for the British economy, the poison of egalitarianism hasn't yet reached the world of employment - that doesn't stop some from trying to fuck that up, too...

* Before you start commenting, telling me I'm talking rubbish, read all of the linked posts. And then fuck off.

28 comments:

Ian QTThanks. I think it is more than Leftists just not waking up. It comes from a deep disrespect for teachers. They won't listen to us because they think we're stupid. If we would just do our jobs properly, then all would be well.

Can we dispense with the patronising attitude towards 'young people'. Whatever the standards of education, some of us can tie our own shoelaces and yesterday I even managed to wipe dribble from my chin unaided.

Citing one comment from Dave's Part as evidence of the terrifying idiocy of a generation is similar to brandishing Peter Hitchens as evidence of the sheer dullness of old people.

Trouble is, bensix, it's more than just one comment. Check out some of the links at Laban Tall's site I referred to, check out some of the stories on the blogs that Ian has linked to.

If you don't believe them, then just go to any newspaper online site that allows comments, find stories that have 'youth' interest, and read them. It won't be long before you'll see 'communication' of the sort referred to in the post.

A pupil is granted a few marks for writing "fuck off' on an exam paper - I can see why some commentators might be alarmed, or possibly amused, that a so-called ' education expert' has colluded with this entertaining episode of modern day nihilism.

But if it was my child I would say that such a hostile attitude would be more of a reflection on me as a parent, rather than the education system per se, [which has always produced a percentage of duffers].

The plain fact is too many parents simply do not have the emotional or financial skills/resources to prime their children to get the most out of the learning environment, irrespective of how imperfect some classrooms might be - I tend to agree with Satres axiom "l'enfer, c'est les autres".

Incidentally, I always thought there was a big difference between equality of opportunity, [i.e. universal entitlement to a reasonable education] and treating children with mixed abilities as though they were all the same, when clearly they are not.

My three children are all doing very well in the state system - the oldest two have achieved high exam marks, good friendships, respect for teachers, etc, the youngest is just dipping his toe in the water.

In fact, schools today seem slightly friendlier places than when I was there - I still have a few faint scorch marks on my backside to prove it [inflicted by Messrs Morley and Porter: two of the, aherm, educationalists from the old school].

Let us not forget the reasoning behind grade-inflation. More must get GCSEs so that more can get A-Levels so that more can go to university ... and why should more go to university? We know why, every cabinet minister told us: "Graduates earn x% more than non-graduates on average, therefore we must have more graduates." Snake oil selling par excellence.

The thing is, Snuffy's right. It isn't just leftwing egalitarianism that's a problem. As well as the liberal (even libertarian) anti-authoritarianism there's also: the belief that all children are basically good; the free market belief that we shouldn't waste money educating those who don't appreciate it; the elitest belief that culture and education is only for the privleged few; a populist contempt for expertise and achievement; humanist contempt for tradition; the technocrat's belief in uniformity of services; the humanist belief in disregarding tradition, and the civil libertarian belief in the freedom of children to go unpunished. The mess that is state education has many parents of many political stripes.

In my view all you can really do is ask: Do they believe in education and who is it they want to educate?

Ah ... yes, A&E, quite correct (I ought to know given the shite upbringing I had). Which is why I believe canings should be inflicted in front of the entire school in assembly for some offences. Especially with bullies. Would do such people good for their victims to see them burst into tears and start whingeing. Well, it would do their victims good anyway.

Oh, I don't doubt there are some teachers who fit the description. But at least in their case the dogma has a significant chance of being tempered by experience. Not likely to happen to the pen-pushers anytime soon.

I agree with you to an extent - the twist comes from the fact that in most of the sink estates and impoverished areas even egalitarianism has been abandoned, opting instead for a form of pseudo-babysitting (I really have to wonder for what purpose, as the parents are seldom doing anything rewarding or life affirming. Success in these areas are judged by the level of behaviour being sufficiently high enough to stop the child (I will not use the phrase "student", as I readily believe here it is out of context) from being expelled frequently.

1. Boris Johnson spilled the beans about the death of grammar schools when he wrote that it was the middle class who didn't want to run the risk of nice Jeremy Smythe having to go to a nasty Sec. Mod. with nasty Tommy Toerag. The pressure for comprehensives came from that quarter.

2. The Tories in the 80s and 90s did away with O-Levels and then allowed polys and HE colleges to degrade the name university.

A question: where do the left fit into all of this? You are blaming us for something that we are not responsible for. You need to look within your own class for the answers.

Completely off topic, I know, but I have just followed the link to Richard Littlejohn.

What a cheeky fucker - does he expect us to believe that Fleet street is not awash with alcoholics, coke heads and lap dancing membership cards - talk about the pot calling the kettle black, this sort of guff even makes politicians look honorable.

Apparently, Nick Griffins favourite journalist [Littlejohn] went to a grammar school, after turning down a scholarship to one of the privates.

The keen Tottenham supporter [Littlejohn] has a criminal conviction after committing an act of violence outside of a nightclub............. in Peterborough [how glamerous].

So there we have it, a bloated football hooligan with a history of violence, not to mention a PhD in hypocrisy - doesn't reflect very well on a supposedly decent education, does it ?

Putting aside references to Littlejohn's past, isn't anybody really bothered by the fact we have some kids who are seemingly being rewarded for their rudeness and ignorance?

At what point does a bad language, blunt response to a reasonable question, even in an exam paper, warrant praise?

The youngster who failed to answer the question might have received marks for declining to answer if he had reasonably and politely declined – maybe on the grounds it was beneath him or, more likely, the examiner could not verify his description of the room around him.

And the idea that extra marks should have been given for including an exclamation mark is laughable; there are plenty of occasiosn where the phrase doesn't need any embellishments.